The following description relates to controlling access to a medical monitoring device and/or a service associated with the device, for example, to help ensure that access to the monitoring device and service is authorized prior to commencing usage.
Advances in sensor technology, electronics, and communications have made it possible for physiological characteristics of patients to be monitored even when the patients are ambulatory and not in continuous, direct contact with a hospital monitoring system. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,959,529 describes a monitoring system in which the patient carries a remote monitoring unit with associated physiological sensors. The remote monitoring unit conducts a continuous monitoring of one or more physiological characteristics of the patient according to the medical problem of the patient, such as the patient's heartbeat and its waveform.
One potential issue associated with the use of such medical monitoring devices is establishing whether the patient's health-care-benefit payer has authorized the use of the monitoring device and service. In the absence of a proper authorization, the patient may use the medical monitoring device and incur significant charges, for example, in the form of rental value of the medical monitoring device, telephone charges, charges at the central monitoring system, and charges by medical personnel, and the providers of those goods and services may not get paid. Bad debts—an increasing concern in the medical field generally—tend to be an even greater concern in the case of a portable medical monitoring device and its service where the physical control of the device is in the hands of a third party, such as a prescribing doctor, who does not own the medical monitoring device and is not responsible for improper charges.